Mountain Dew is one of my illicit indulgences. I know that it's so bad for me but every once in a while I just can't resist drinking one. So when I saw this Throwback Mountain Dew made with "Real Sugar" I knew I had to get my hands on some. After a quick online search I drove thirty minutes to a Target that had twelve packs in stock for just over $5. The place where I first saw it was selling cans for like $2.50. Totally worth the drive because I got 12 cans for the price of 2. It's surprisingly different from the corn syrup version--which Amaya hates. It's lighter in flavor and sweetness and so much better. Amaya likes to pour it into a fancy glass to drink it and I am clearly going to be headed back to Target sooner, rather than later, to get more. Sometimes a "throwback" really is better than what we can get now.

We made it to Solebury Orchards today. The sun was out, the air was cool with a breeze and the apples were plentiful. We filled out bag with gala and honeycrisp apples. It was great to get to the orchard early today, as opposed to our fiasco last year when we couldn't even find parking and went with our staple backup plan, soft serve custard. Amaya made an interesting assessment of the morning, wishing the apples were less plentiful so that the actual picking experience would have been longer and more challenging.

It is always exciting to come across imported candies. They have a style that is different than what we are exposed to on a daily basis. Aki and I had the good fortune to tour the Cadbury Factory in New Zealand. That experience has stayed with me for years. The exposure to the chocolates has had me constantly searching out confections from outside the USA for new looks, techniques, flavors and ideas. Today I picked up a some bars of delight, featuring honeycomb, air bubbles and pop rocks.

Doughnut kouign amann. We use the trimmings from our meltaway doughnuts to make these magnificent marvels. The finished doughnut has a crisp crackling exterior. The interior is full of buttery, sweet and decadent layers of dough. We named them AKA's for also known as. It made sense to me.

I have always thought of ribs as a slow cooked meat. Ribs are time sensitive. They take time to cook. That is the lore I have always been told and believed. Aki came home with a rack of baby back ribs. Her plan was to cut them into individual ribs, salt, rest for a couple of hours, and then do a quick grill over high heat. She got the idea here. I looked at her with serious doubt. I watched her prepare the ribs, making sure to carefully removing the membrane on the back of the ribs, another detail I often scoff at.

When it was time to grill, I jumped in to cook the ribs. If there was a miracle on rib street, I wanted to see it. I put the ribs on a ripping hot grill and let them cook covered for a few minutes. I turned them and closed the lid again. At this point the ribs were sizzling and browning. I flipped them a few more times and poked them as well to feel for doneness. When the ribs were firm and felt juicy I pulled them off and let them rest on a plate for 5 minutes. We sat down to the plate of ribs and went to town. The meat had a beautiful char, a crispy chew, and rich juiciness. We're definitely making these again.

I like recipes that allow me to customize the results. We start with a solid foundation. Then we explore the potential of interchangeable parts. Today we changed the sugar in our shortbread from powdered sugar to maple. The maple sugar shortbread is rich and decadent. It has a caramelized undertone and has a luxurious feel. It is a shortbread that makes you pay attention to it. The plan was to make a maple shortbread for maple crumbs for doughnuts. The result has me rethinking the flavor potential of sugar.

The success of an idea is measured on whether it can be brought to life. Our new-don noodles are tender, chewy, and slightly slippery. They have a distinct resiliency. The noodles can withstand the rough dressing of a dry stir-fry style as well as a saucy sauce. They are not like any udon I have eaten. They eat like the udon I wish existed.

Freshly picked basil and cherry tomatoes, split, drizzled with extra virgin olive oil and sprinkled with salt and pepper. This rests happily at room temperature, the flavors mingling and merging, while you make the rest of the meal--even if that just means slicing up a baguette and pulling out some butter. If you love basil, eat it as is. If you like basil, remove the leaves before eating. Their flavor will still linger with subtlety rather than punch. Either way it's the perfect taste of summer.

Years ago we used a starch paste in making our masa cavatelli. For some reason we did not think to make the connection to apply it to long noodles. Until recently. We are currently exploring thick, chewy, and slurpable udon noodles. We make a starch paste with cornstarch and use that paste to hydrate and make the noodles. The results are tender, chewy and crushable. We shall continue to tinker as we work towards a recipe we can leave alone.

Once a week Alex and I go to Cross Keys Diner for some variation on brunch. It's our favorite local spot and am a sucker for their Reuben sandwiches. It's safe to say that I order them about half the time that we eat there. So when I saw a breakfast Reuben on their specials list today, I was all over it. Think Reuben with grilled onions instead of sauerkraut and two fried eggs. It was just as delicious as it sounds.

I have taken the name and adapted it to an idea. The caramel apples were delicious. But they did not allow the doughnuts or the apples to shine to my satisfaction. Today we formed strips of our meltaway dough on skewers and fried them. They have a spring-like appearance. They cook up fantastically crisp with a bit of a chew. They are both fun to eat and deliciously satisfying.

Our volunteer basil plant is representative of a forgotten idea. Its initial appearance brought a smile and some attention. We payed attention to it and even watered it a few times. Then we forgot about it again. The basil developed and matured without us. I looked over at the plant one day and appreciated its beauty and growth. I harvested a few leaves and then left it alone again. It's increased size may catch my eye more often earning a bit more attention now. Perhaps we'll even water and trim it as our desire for basil increases in its presence.

We have found that letting fruit rest under a light cloth at room temperature prevents fruit flies and allows the fruit to slowly become ripe. One unexpected benefit is that when you draw the cloth aside the fruits aroma rushes up at you and makes your mouth water. This is the first summer we have begun using this method. We will continue to test and observe to see if the perceived benefits hold up over the long haul.

We often have a few ears of corn left over from corn on the cob nights. The steamed corn is a canvas for flavors. Aki dressed our most recent batch of corn with spicy pickle juice. I thought it was brilliant and it tasted delicious. She had made pickle corn. It turns out she served the pickle corn with hot dogs. I topped my dogs with a generous amount of the corn, making corn dogs. Simple connections became delicious results.

We are able to make most of our doughnut holes into doughnut clusters. But a few of our doughs resist becoming a cluster. We have stopped making clusters with our not quite vegan dough and instead make additional beignets. I tried making clusters with our meltaway dough but the layers in the dough caused the doughnut clusters to splay apart when we fried them. The doughnut holes were delicious bites. But the clusters were not well formed. As I thought about the holes I wondered if we could skewer them and fry them together as one long doughnut on a stick. Today we put the idea into action. The holes held together beautifully on the skewer and created a doughnut kabob. We coated them with our vanilla-buttermik glaze and dusted them with strawberry crumbs. Eating the doughnut skewer was as much fun as making it.

We take the cuttings from the first roll of our meltaway doughnuts and then we roll them into a new dough. We take that and cut it into into squares, scoring the tops to encourage an opening when they are fried. Once cooked, we tuck dried apples cooked in caramel sauce into the crevices. The result is an apple fritter-esque experience. This new addition to our entourage is called a springer.

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